


in a hot, dense state

by curiouslyfic



Category: Star Trek (2009), The Big Bang Theory
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, M/M, STXI Kink Meme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-14
Updated: 2010-07-14
Packaged: 2017-10-10 13:23:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/100255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curiouslyfic/pseuds/curiouslyfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Leonard contemplates "normal", Jim's just moved in, Spock's on a schedule, and Pavel speaks French. Welcome to Halo Night at Enterprise Estates.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in a hot, dense state

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the st_xi_kink_meme prompt [here](http://community.livejournal.com/st_xi_kink_meme/11451.html?thread=11503803#t11503803).

Living with Spock isn't something Leonard's done by _choice_, he really didn't have any other options. He needed a place and Spock had room and for what the university pays them, it's cheap enough to be okay. So Leonard has a vested interest in making it work, because moving in with Pavel's _mother_ or into the basement hovel Hikaru's calling home are occasionally appealing, in that they're Spock-free zones, but Leonard wouldn't call either of them potentially long-term. He's had enough of Pavel's mother from just the stories he's heard and honestly, most of those make him almost grateful he's got Spock.

At least Leonard's learned how to shut Spock up. From what he's heard, Pavel's still working on ways to engineer a gag for his mom.

Besides, their apartment's a geek's wet dream, all the consoles worth having expertly wired to their 30-inch flatscreen and enough memorabilia to feel like a live-in version of the comic book shop. Leonard tells himself he'll grow out of it eventually, adults mature out of this stuff, but a long day of brilliance in his university-funded nook needs to end in a round of Halo-as-digital-bloodsport.

Leonard thinks sometimes about the medical career he could have had if he hadn't fallen in love with String Theory when he did. With his luck, he'd have ended up divorced and enlisting, serving somewhere with some other Spock.

He's seriously considering making Spock a sarcasm sign, because if Spock's going to teach himself social constructs by making Leonard _explain_, Leonard's going to need a few teaching aids, and he's definitely not thinking about how they've both managed to slink away shamefully from a proffer of sperm—and oh God, what was he thinking letting Spock even attempt to reproduce?—when he notices Scotty's door is wide open and hello, that's not Scotty or his odd little friend standing lost in a sea of boxes, staring blankly at the wall.

Leonard liked Scotty well enough, for the guy across the hall, but they'd never done much socializing before Scotty moved. Well, Leonard couldn't, Leonard has _Spock_, who thinks having Hikaru and Pavel over for Halo Night is what most people consider an active social life, and really, Spock's not the kind of thing you spring on anyone you like. Too much explaining, too few teaching aids.

"Hey, look, Scotty moved," Leonard says, which he knows is stupid well before Spock says, "It's that kind of observation that's going to win you the Nobel," which means Leonard blows the first crucial moments of eye contact with the new neighbor trying not to choke Spock.

Spock says, "I believe some form of introduction is required," staring at Leonard like it's somehow _his_ job, and the new guy looks away to smile. Leonard hopes it's not a smirk; he's not sure he can handle the prospect of not having somewhere close to hide when Spock drives him nuts.

Not that he did that much with Scotty but now that he's thought it, it seems like a great idea.

Someone clears their throat. Its, oh, it's the new guy, who's crossed the sea of boxes like there's actually a path to madness Leonard just can't see and who's now hovering in his very open door. "New neighbors, huh? Hi. I'm Jim Kirk."

Jim holds out a hand. It's a little dusty from hauling boxes, a little rough in spots, but it's warm enough and Jim's not one of those assholes who plays crush-the-geek with his grip, so it's okay. Spock looks like he wants to go for the Lysol, like he's calculating the likelihood Jim's carrying some sort of mutant ebola through his move. No, Leonard realizes grimly, Spock looks like he can't parse which social situation this is.

Leonard prays he doesn't ask.

"Hi, I'm Leonard." Wait, Jim gave his last name, Leonard should, too. "Leonard McCoy." Spock clears his throat a little. Leonard drops Jim's hand like it's hot. Jim's eyes are really blue. Jim's smile is really nice, no sign he's already planning to taunt the geeks, either, which is appallingly rare in Leonard's experience. Outside the university and the comic book store, he's used to being ignored but Jim, Jim's looking at him like he thinks Leonard's worth his time and that, that's something.

Spock clears his throat again. Jim's smile turns into a grin. Leonard winces awkwardly—_dammit, Spock_—and adds, "Right, and this is Spock. Ignore him. We all do."

Jim makes a point of looking behind him. "We _all_ do, huh?"

Really, Leonard's IQ is higher than this. He's all messed up right now but really, it is totally possible he could win a Nobel, screw what Spock says.

Spock's getting antsy, Leonard can hear him shifting in place, probably looking forlornly back at their apartment door, mentally recalculating the schedule adjustments necessary to make time for Indian food _and_ Halo Night. Leonard wants to cringe again.

Fuck it, at this point, Spock's probably already worked out the precise loss of temperature their food's undergone since they left Bombay Palace.

"Leonard," Spock says quietly, or, well, quietly for Spock, and when Leonard ignores him to prove his point to Jim, Spock does it again in that borderline Asperger's way he has and when Leonard can't take it, when Spock's on restless "_Leonard_" number five, Leonard spits out a deflective, "It's Halo Night."

Jim waits a moment before he nods. "Okay. Have fun." Only, Jim's not walking away, Jim's just standing there staring at them both—_him_, Jim's a not-Spock neighbor who's staring at _him_—and that's when Leonard remembers how badly socialized he is, too.

"You play it? Halo? It's a game." _Case in point…_ "We like to play. It's a game we like to play. Sometimes. When we're not going out. You know. Like people do." _Other people. Who aren't geeks._ He doesn't think he needs to say that part but maybe he does.

If Jim notices the awkwardness—and how could he not?—he seems willing to let it slide. "Yeah, I play. Why? You guys need a third?" Jim cranes his head to survey the sea of boxes still littering his floor. It's probably hitting Spock right on the _must organize_ quirk. Leonard's perversely glad. "I've probably got my controller around here somewhere," Jim says idly, ominously, because if it's anywhere in those boxes, they're not going to find it tonight. And when Jim's still scanning his boxes and sort of biting his lip and he asks distractedly, "Hey, what console do you have?" Leonard can't stop Spock from saying, "All of them," with some baffled measure of pride.

.

Jim's a smart guy, Leonard can tell. Not working-at-the-university smart, maybe, but he holds his own. He's certainly not overwhelmed by what's on Spock's board, not to the tune-out-and-run point Leonard's so used to seeing from non-geeks, and when Jim hears it's just _Spock's_ board, he actually asks to see Leonard's, too.

Plus, when he tells them about how his shower's all messed up and Leonard silently strong-arms Spock into letting Jim use theirs without freaking out and Leonard tells Jim the hair products are all Spock's, Leonard's nowhere near dorky enough for _Darth Vader shampoo, as if_, Jim nods solemnly and plays along.

Jim's still in there, soaping up—which Leonard is not thinking about, thank you very much—when Pavel and Hikaru show up, Pavel slinking in in clothes that make Leonard want to make the 70's take disco back and Hikaru actually laptop-free for once—it's been a constant, terrifying presence since his folks got DSL and a web cam and decided Spock and Leonard were like _Katashi and Jirou_, which will haunt Leonard until he dies—and Leonard knows he should say something about how they've got a guest but really, he's too busy trying to find some way to kick them out. Nicely, he wants to be nice here, they are his friends, but he doesn't need to deal with Jim meeting Pavel _and_ Spock, not all at once like that, it'll chase Jim off for sure.

So of course Spock says, "Leonard let a man in our shower."

Pavel perks right up. Hikaru slinks into his spot. "A _man_?" Pavel swaggers. Hikaru smirks. "A real one?"

"Yes, a _real_ one," Leonard says, more defensive than he should, and Pavel can stop swaggering any time. "Oh, look, we're out of Jolt."

Usually, that's the sort of news that would send them all scrambling out the door. Sadly, it seems to pale by comparison with the prospect of Jim. "No, we aren't," Spock says in that tone that says he thinks it's a miracle Leonard gets himself _dressed_.

"Peanuts," Leonard says on a desperate wave of inspiration. "I smell _peanuts_," which should be enough to make at least _Pavel_ go, only Pavel says logically, "It's not Thai night."

Hikaru smirks lazy from the couch.

Leonard likes to think the law of averages has his back here but the shower's stopped and he realizes that—and damn it, the implications—about the time Jim attempts the run back to his place in nothing but a grin and a _towel_ and okay, this is one of those nightmare moments Leonard's going to relive for years because Jim _stops_.

"Oh, hi," Jim says, like he's not even _flustered_ by all the strangers in the room, and the way Jim says, "Jim Kirk, just moved in across the hall" sets Pavel off on what promises to be a string of unfortunate pick-up lines.

Leonard's heard enough of Pavel's Spanish to know he's probably making most of it up, but that hasn't stopped him yet. Pavel starts with, "_Enchantee_," in broad, flat French, and it goes downhill from there. Jim's a bit wide-eyed.

"Sorry? Didn't catch that." Jim clutches a little tighter at that towel.

"You've never been told how breathtaking you are in flawless Spanish before?" Pavel clucks his tongue and—there's no other word for it—horns in. "Chekov, Pavel Andreivich. And trust me, _senor_, the pleasure's all mine."

Hikaru doesn't _speak_ around, well, anyone he doesn't know, really, but he says a lot with his smirk.

Jim does an admirable job of ignoring the kiss Pavel tries to drop on the back of his hand. Spock dives for his seat, just in case Jim gets ideas. It's tragic, how well Leonard knows that man. Maybe they are a little Katashi and Jirou.

"Uh, right, I should...put pants on," Jim says and foolishly lifts one hand off the towel to wave at the door.

"There is no need," Pavel purrs, then fires off in rapid Russian and ends in a leery, "It would be a shame to spoil such a view."

Spock's already got his dinner out and he's clutching it defensively, going at it with his fork because yes, Leonard may be watching a nightmare scenario play out and Pavel may be one bad line from getting punched but damn it, it _is_ still Halo Night. Leonard bets if he asks, Spock can tell him the precise schedule adjustments required. He nearly does, just to buy Jim time to escape Pavel's "charm".

"No," Jim says, shaking his head and pulling back his hand. He looks Pavel over and shakes his head again. "Just..._no_."

It probably makes Leonard a terrible friend that he's glad to see Pavel shot down this once. Jim's nice, Jim's _normal_, Leonard needs more of that in his life.

"Twenty minutes," Spock says ominously over a forkful of something he's all-too-quick to cram in his mouth. "Keep this up and there'll be no _bathroom time_."

Hikaru's one more Pavel come-on from a popcorn gif, Leonard can tell by the sheer glee in his smirk, and the saddest part of that statement is that right now, Hikaru's the only one of his friends who's not making Leonard actively want to crawl under his own bed and hide until Jim moves. Or develops a convenient case of amnesia. Whichever comes first.

"Pants," Jim says again, holds the word like a shield, "I need pants now, I'll be back," and he looks at Leonard with something terribly like hope. "Nice to meet you guys."

All Leonard can do is nod.

He's pretty sure Jim's smart enough to run as fast and as far as he can from the geek collective in Enterprise Estates Apartment 3B. After all, it's the _nice guy-normal_ thing to do.

.

Incredibly, Jim comes back. More credibly, it doesn't go Leonard's way.

He's dragged Spock into the bedroom for a serious rehash of the rules, because there's nothing in the 48-page room mate agreement Leonard signed when he moved in that specifically barred new people from participating in Halo Night. The horrible silence that followed Jim walking out, still holding that towel for dear life, broke like Pavel's "charm", turned into Pavel accusing Leonard of trying to steal Jim for himself and being a complete and total _something_ that broke into more rapid Russian and an angry pout before resolving itself into the single killjoy accusation of "Cockblock".

From there, Leonard had a schedule-twitchy Spock to manage _and_ a pissy Pavel to deal with, too, and he'd been so busy trying to play conflict manager, he hadn't noticed Hikaru leave.

He'd left Pavel stewing on the couch, content that Leonard would let him practice with the plasma grenades if Pavel would just _let it go, oh my god_, and there'd been a whole instant where things looked up and then Spock had started on the restrictions guiding Halo Night, _no strangers allowed_, McCoy, and since pissy Pavel likes to rile up Spock for puerile revenge, Leonard had had no choice but to shuttle Spock off to his bedroom to make his case.

What Leonard needs to know, what he doesn't because he's busy dealing with Spock, is that Hikaru's across the hall, knocking on what used to be Scotty's door and leaning easy against the edge of the frame. Jim's in his new apartment tugging on the first pair of pants he can find, hopping awkwardly to the door and praying it's not the disco creeper again; Jim's already had too much of him for one night.

It's totally the smirky Asian guy, who looks all too happy to spend his time leaning by Jim's new door.

"Hey, hi, sorry, I didn't get your name," Jim says with a grin he can't help.

"Hikaru Sulu," he hears, and neither of them go for the handshake, they're both too busy sizing each other up. Jim hopes Hikaru likes what he sees, too. There's a whole lot of promise in that sly, sexy smirk. "Two questions: you eat yet and are you up for LAN play?" That smirk has nothing on the hot, wicked tease of Hikaru's dark eyes, the way he sounds like life's a joke he might share.

Jim tries to look thoughtful, intelligent, something beyond dumbstruck and _hard_, because if Hikaru's spending his free time around Leonard and Spock, he's got to be a pretty bright guy, too, and hell, Jim's the only genius repeat offender to ever bust out of the midwest. "You don't have to do this," he says, because it's possible Hikaru's trying to make up for the disco creeper getting them all off on the wrong foot, only that jacks up a corner of Hikaru's mouth wryly, which is just _goddamn_.

"I'm guessing McCoy forgot to mention we make Halo a bloodspot," Hikaru says. "And if you mean Chekov, he's a big boy. More than old enough to apologize for himself."

Jim's a little sunk already but Hikaru takes out his battleship with a tiny, easy shrug.

"Ah, no, I haven't eaten yet." Jim could seriously start with Hikaru's mouth. He wants to taste that a lot.

Hikaru nods like he's heard the stuff Jim didn't say. "Up for a little butter chicken and tag team revenge?"

And it is so Jim's life that Hikaru needs to remind him to find a shirt.

So Leonard emerges vaguely victorious from having it out with Spock to find Jim wedged in on the couch, hip-to-thigh with Hikaru and practically sharing a fork. When Hikaru gets a little clumsy with his sauce, Jim stares intently at the quick pink flash of tongue toying over the corner of Hikaru's mouth.

And when they get to Halo, Hikaru and Jim work a tag team almost as smoothly as Leonard and Spock.

And later, much later, when all their guests are heading out and it looks depressingly like Hikaru's not going to have to walk very far before bed, Leonard finally manages to eyebrow waggle him into the kitchen for a _chat_. He thinks it might have gone better if Hikaru hadn't looked so _amused_.

"You don't talk to strangers," Leonard says helplessly with a flail of frustration he can't stop. "Sulu, what the hell?"

Hikaru blinks, unrepentant. "I do talk to strangers sometimes. Pretty hard to live without doing it once in a while, right? I _don't_ talk to pretty girls and fools." Then Hikaru fist-bumps Leonard's arm congenially and _winks_ and says over his shoulder, "Don't know if you caught this, McCoy, but Jim's not a girl. As for the rest, we'll see."

Then he's gone and Spock's grumbling about their defeat—_Halo_, he means _Halo_, Spock probably didn't notice anything else happening tonight—and Leonard spends a while thinking about Katashi and Jirou, staring at his ceiling constellations glowing in the dark.

On the up side, he _does_ get to hide out from Spock sometimes at Jim's place. He just has to knock first, so he doesn't catch them going at it on the couch.


End file.
